A Helping Hand?
Lying on his back in the shade of the tree, taking a well earned rest after walking all night to lead the trolls to this shady glade, Jim Lake could not believe just how incredibly lucky he was. When he had taken Merlin's magic potion and immersed himself in it, well aware that the changes it would bring would be permanent, he figured that meant he would be leaving behind everyone he knew and loved forever. Much to his surprise, when he had to leave with the trolls to find a new Heartstone, his girlfriend Claire Nuñez offered to go with him. With her clever use of the satellite view of Google Maps she was not only able to help them avoid contact with humans who might not be as understanding as those from his hometown of Arcadia Oaks, but she was able to plot a route that allowed them to safely reach shelter where they would be safe from the sun before it rose in the morning and seriously harmed and/or killed them all (except for Claire, who of course was still human.) Even better was how she looked as though she still cared for him, like she wasn't repulsed his appearance despite how he was now half-troll. Looking up at her as she cradled his head in her lap, her eyes shining as she smiled down at him, he could almost forget that he wasn't entirely human anymore. Almost.
"A tale as old as time," Jim mused dreamily.
"What?" Claire asked him, not wholly able to suppress her surprised chuckle.
"I just cannot help but wonder," Jim clarified, "I find it strange and confusing, pleasantly so I might add, that such a capable beauty such as yourself would willingly choose to remain with a dumb beast like me."
"Come on, Jim," Claire playfully scolded him with a swat to the top of his head, which he only felt because it ruffled his hair, "you're NOT a dumb beast."
"You kidding me?" Jim asked her, keeping his tone light, "You see these fangs, these paws? All I need is a healthy coat of fur and a full-length cape and I bet Disney would have been scouting me for the live-action adaptation of their movie about Stockholm Syndrome."
"Not true," Claire disagreed, her playful smile still on her lips, "You'd also need to be able to sing. You definitely showed some acting chops in our play, but the moment you let a note escape your lips I bet those scouts would be running for the hills!"
Aware that he was being teased Jim turned his head to look at her again, narrowing his eyes (though he couldn't wipe the huge grin off his face) as he asked, "Oh? Is that so?"
"Don't forget: I had the misfortune of listening to you sing to me during my mother's fundraising barbecue," Claire told him as she stood up, then she began to reenact the crooning his "lovey-dovey" clone (produced by his amulet when it had the Aspectus stone inserted in it) had performed that day, much to his embarrassment.
Flipping himself over and resting his weight on all fours, Jim felt a low growl from within his chest as, grinning ear to ear, he said to her, "Claire Nuñez, you asked for it, and now you're gonna get it!"
With a squeal of delight Claire spun and sprinted off into the glade. Jim felt an urge to start right off after her, but he held himself back as he wanted to give her a sporting head start.
"8….9….10!" Jim said aloud just before sprinting after her with inhuman speed. However, even though he caught up to her rather quickly he found himself hard pressed to actually catch her. While she no longer had the Skrathe-Hrün, having sacrificed it to seal Morgana Le Fay in the Shadow Realm forever, it was clear that her time training to use it served to greatly increase her agility and reflexes. Every time he got close to actually grabbing her Claire would duck, twist, or jump out of the way at the last second, leaving him a couple yards past her and clutching at nothing but air. At one point, when Claire ran straight into a knot of trees that had grown too close together, Jim was sure that he had her. However, just as Jim sprang at her Claire performed a backflip, pressing off his shoulders with her hands for greater distance, and the momentum he would have used to tackle her to the ground instead sent him crashing headlong into that knot of trees with such force that one of the skinnier saplings snapped where he impacted and toppled over backwards. It didn't hurt, not really, and he flipped over onto his back to give Claire a sheepish smile.
Just as he was about to concede defeat, however, saw a flash of light out of the corner of his eye just before being blinded by an intense burning pain that almost blocked out everything else. It felt like his left hand and forearm were on fire! So great was the pain that he barely noticed Claire calling his name and didn't even know she was there until she tackled him to the side. Almost immediately the burning sensation faded away, though he still felt a hard, throbbing ache in his arm. "Oooh, ahhh! Just….just hold still, Jim," he heard Clair say, concern and sympathetic pain evident in her voice. A short moment later he felt something cool and creamy being rubbed on his hand and on his arm just under his armor. Blinking a few times to clear his vision, Jim saw Claire applying a burn cream on his hand (which looked as though it was severely sunburnt) before she went back to her Infinite Bag of Holding that Merlin created for her shortly after their departure from home and pulled out a roll of gauze and some medical tape. "I just wish I could get this armor off you so I could treat this properly," she added, "Thank goodness I took that first aid extra curricular my sophomore year."
"I wish I could get this armor off too," Jim groaned in agreement, "I don't even want to think about how I smell under it. I'm just glad I haven't felt the need to use the restroom since my transformation."
"I'm so sorry about this, Jim," Claire said remorsefully as she wrapped his hand in gauze, "it's my fault you got hurt like this."
Following with his eyes the beam of sunlight that had done the damage, Jim saw that his Sword of Eclipse had flown off his back when he crashed into the trees and landed just outside the glade, reflecting the sunlight back into this shaded area. "No, this is entirely my fault, Claire," Jim disagreed as he summoned his blade back to his hand, "I'm the dumb idiot who didn't secure my equipment before our impromptu game of tag."
"Stop that!" Claire yelled in frustration, her exclamation punctuated with a sudden tightening of the gauze around his hand which caused him to hiss in pain. "Sorry, sorry!" Claire hastily apologized, "I just wish you would stop putting yourself down so much. You are NOT and idiot!"
"Yeah? Tell that to Vendel, to Draal," Jim countered, "Tell that to all the innocent trolls Gunmar turned into his Gumm-Gumm army, or to the survivors here who lost their home and now have to march clear across America to find themselves another one."
"None of that was your fault!" Claire protested, but Jim shook his head as he argues, "I am the Trollhunter. THE Trollhunter. You and Toby might have chosen to help me out with your mystical objects, for which I'll be forever grateful, but it was my sacred duty to keep Gunmar from escaping the Darklands. I failed to do so, and because of that he enslaved then killed Draal, Queen Usurna killed Vendel, Morgana escaped….you get the idea."
"But that wasn't your fault, it was ours," Clair disagreed, "Me, Toby, Blinky, Aarghh and yes, even Draal. We all were warned that attempting to rescue you could result in Gunmar getting free, we decided that you were worth the risk. Besides, you defeated Gunmar in the end."
"For all the good that did for the trolls he enslaved," Jim countered, "Besides, I couldn't defeat Morgana. My big idea for defeating the immortal sorceress was impaling her with my sword. If it weren't for you, the risk you took, the sacrifice you made, we would all be Morgana's slaves or worse."
"I couldn't have done that if you hadn't saved me first, back when Morgana hijacked my body and imprisoned my soul in the Shadow Realm," Claire told him fondly, "I would have spent the rest of eternity caring for an illusion of Enrique and studying for an exam that was never to come if you didn't come for me, so thank you."
Jim couldn't help but smile at that, and at that moment he very much wanted to kiss her. As he reached out for Claire, though, Jim caught sight of his bandaged hand and the burned skin underneath, and he turned away again as Claire said, "Jim? What's wrong?"
"Claire, what are we doing?" Jim asked her dejectedly, "Pretending like everything's normal when we both know that it's not?"
"James Lake Jr., for as long as I've known you our lives have been far from 'normal'," Clare told him and a jovial tone, obviously trying to lighten up the mood though Jim could still see the worry in her eyes, "I mean I spent a good part of last year pretending that a changeling was my brother so my parents wouldn't worry until you rescued my real brother from the Darklands."
"You know what I mean, Claire," Jim retorted, shrugging her hand off his shoulder as he stood and strode to the edge of the shade provided by the glade, "Even if our lives were filled with daily strangeness we at least were human. Now I can't even be within reflected sunlight without ending up with the world's worst sunburn. What would happen if I were to step out there now? Would I turn to stone? Turn to dust? Would I suffer fatal third-degree burns?"
"Jim…" he heard Claire call out to him sympathetically from behind him, though she didn't try to touch him again.
"Even if we eventually find a way to remove my armor who knows if I can have a family the way I am now," Jim continued, "Besides, we know exactly two places that I can be accepted: one is back in Arcadia Oaks, the other is the new home we're taking the trolls to. Everywhere else I'd most likely be treated like a monster. Not to mention that I wouldn't be able to go out with you anywhere, not during the day at least, and I can't keep you with me underground. What kind of life would that be?"
"Jim, are you….are you saying you want to break up with me?" Jim heard Claire ask him, her voice cracking with emotion halfway through before she was able to regain composure.
"Yes. No! I don't know!" Jim tried to answer her, though his head was as muddled as his turbulent emotions. Mr. Strickler tried to explain how difficult it would be to manage the emotional states of both his human and troll halves simultaneously, but what advice he'd been able to offer turned out to be woefully inadequate. Clutching his head, Jim continued, "I just…I just don't know what to do from here."
"Poor young warrior," a voice Jim had never heard before echoed through the glade. It sounded female, yet seemed so ancient that it made his hair stand on end. Jim was sure that if he was still 100% human that goosebumps would be breaking out over every inch of his body. As it was he couldn't help allowing a low snarl to escape from his lips as he held the Sword of Eclipse before him while he was searching for the voice's source as it said, "Not quite human, not quite troll, totally unsure as to who he is."
"Not really fitting in either society he seeks to render himself alone, but his heart isn't ready to let go in spite of what his head tells it," a second female, and equally old, voice chimed in, but Jim had yet to find the first speaker as he saw Claire behind him pick up a long branch and hold it before her in a battle-ready position.
"Certainly noble, yet wholly unnecessary," a third ancient female voice added, "particularly when there is someone who can help him get back a bit of what he has lost."
"Who's out there?" Jim called out, certain that it wasn't any of their troll companions, "Show yourselves!"
"There's no need to speak with such menace, young one," the first voice said again as the speaker, an old crone with long raven hair, materialized before him and Claire along with two others, one with silver hair and one that was blonde. That's the best way that Jim was able to describe it, for he was certain that he and Claire had been alone in this part of the glade while Blinky and the others were resting in the deeper, more shadowy heart of it. Yet here these three incredibly old women were now, stepping out of the shadows of the trees before them as if they'd always been here. Other than the color of their hair they looked rather identical to each other, each holding before them an equally weathered waling stick and wearing rough, brown hooded robes like a group of hobos living in an alley. Or like the trio of witches from the Macbeth play Claire starred in what seems like a lifetime ago.
"We are not your enemies," the silver haired one told them.
"We're just trying to help you," the blond woman added.
"Just who are you ladies?" Claire asked them, placing a steadying hand on Jim's shoulder though (thankfully) still holding her branch in her other hand.
"We have had many names," the raven haired one said, rather evasively in Jim's opinion, "Some more flattering than others."
"We were around when you humans were struggling to survive in caves," the one with silver hair expounded.
"We witnessed as you formed the first nations and as you discovered magic," the blond continued.
"We were here when you tossed magic aside, foolishly declaring that it doesn't exist, and turned to science instead," the raven hair added rather contemptuously.
"And assuming that you have not foolishly destroyed this world in the process, we will be here long after you're gone," the silver hair finished for them.
"So you ladies have been around for a long time, like Merlin?" Jim asked them, growing interested in spite of himself.
The raven hair huffed with contempt as she said, "Merlin is but a child compared to us."
"Much as your own grandparents are children compared to Merlin," the silver hair continued.
"We've forgotten more about magic than the old wizard will ever know," the blond agreed.
"So you're saying that you could, what, turn me human again?" Jim asked them, both suspicious and reluctant to allow himself to hope that it's possible.
"At one time such a feat was possible for us, yes," raven hair answered.
"But our patriarch has recently expressly forbidden us to intervene in human affairs," silver hair clarified.
"But we do know who can help you achieve your wish and where you can find him," Blond hair assured him." blond hair assured him.
"Really? Who?" Claire asked them.
"You must go to the great city of New York." "To the island of Manhattan." "There, atop the tallest building…" "…you will find an man named Owen Burnett." "Of those with the ability to grant you what you seek…" "…he would be the least likely to deny you or to demand too steep a price." "As it will be a great practice spell for his young charge to learn" The three crones explained in tandem with one another.
As Claire looked up the information in Google Maps, Jim glared at the three and said, "We're already looking at a 900 hour cross-country hike, that's over three months one way with us travelling only at night, just to reach the Heartstone that's supposedly in Jersey, and you want us to go even further out of our way on what may be a wild goose chase?"
"There's no need for you to walk there, young warrior," the raven hair answered him.
"Your sorceress companion behind you can take you straight there," the silver hair explained further.
"Uh, no I can't!" Claire countered, "I'm no sorceress, okay?"
"But of course you are, little one," the raven hair disagreed.
"You wrested control of the Skrathe-Hrün from Morgana Le Fay even while she was actively commanding it," the silver hair continued.
"You defeated her in a one-on-one duel and banished her to the Shadow Realm," the blond hair added.
"These aren't the feats of a neophyte practitioner, young sorceress," the three crones said simultaneously.
"Look, that all sounds great when you say it like that, but even it I hadn't destroyed the shadow staff in order to ensure that Morgana remains trapped in the Shadow Realm, the last time I created a portal that large for that long it nearly killed me," Claire explained to them, "What's more is that it allowed Morgana to kick my soul to the Shadow Realm while she took my body for a joyride, and by that I mean that she tried to use it to kill my boyfriend. I'm not exactly looking to hand the keys over to her again anytime soon."
The three crones looked at each other for a moment before the silver haired one hand out to Claire and gently said, "Hand me your staff, young one."
Claire looked in confusion between the branch she was holding and the three crones as she asked, "You mean my walking stick?" After they nodded yes Claire handed it over. The crones then gathered in a huddle with the branch between them and started murmuring softly, and Jim could have sworn he saw some light flare up between them before the parted and faced them again. Much to Jim's amazement the branch they were handing back looked radically transformed: it was smoother and straighter, its color much brighter, almost a translucent white that seemed glow within this shade. In fact it almost looked like the staff Gandalf had when he returned to Aragorn and the others as Gandalf the White.
"You will find that this staff will be much more agreeable to you than Morgana's, young sorceress," The silver hair crone said as Claire took the staff from her.
"It operates very similarly to the Skrathe-Hrün with one key difference," the blond hair informed her, "It's powered by light magic, which is fueled by your positive emotions, so you won't have to worry about it corrupting your soul and allowing Morgana a foothold again."
"We even gave it a boost the first time you use it, so you can create a portal large enough for your friends to travel though without straining yourself," the raven hair added, "Not to mention that we preselected a destination for that first use that puts you fairly close to where Owen is while allowing your friends to hide while you seek him out."
"I….I don't know what to say," Claire admitted as she hugged her new staff to her chest before she told them, "Thank you."
"Wait, isn't this kinda 'intervening in human affairs', you guys doing this?" Jim asked them, spotting a hole in their logic.
"Not at all," the raven hair disagreed, "We just gave her the ability to truly realize her full potential."
"So that she might help you realize yours," the silver hair added.
"Whether either, both, or neither takes advantage of the opportunity presented you is entirely your decision."
"But why are you doing this?" Jim asked them, not wholly able to shake off his suspicion as their offer is too tempting, "just what is in it for you anyways?"
"Our reasons are our own and likely too complex for such short-lived creatures like you to grasp anyways," the raven hair told him.
"Suffice it to say that we wish to do what we can to repay a debt we owe someone," the silver hair clarified.
"And we wish to help another repay their debt as well," the blond hair added.
"You said earlier that this Owen is the "least likely" to turn us down," Claire asked them, "but what if he does anyway."
"It's highly doubtful that he will turn you down outright," raven hair countered.
"But should he prove reluctant just call him by his true name and tell him who sent you his way," silver hair told them.
"That should break through his misgivings and convince him to help you," blond hair finished for them.
"Owen isn't his true name?" Jim asked them, "Then what is it?"
The silver haired crone approached him and grasped his bandaged hand between both of hers, which felt rather pleasingly warm, for a second before the three answered all together, "Puck." the silver hair then released his hand and stepped away.
"Puck….puck…" Jim mused for a moment, then as it came to him he said, "Wait, you don't mean Puck from 'A Midsumm-'…just where they go?"
Jim and Claire looked all around them, but the three crones were nowhere to be found. In fact the only sign that they had been there in the first place was the white staff Claire was still holding onto. Feeling the tingle in his bandaged hand begin to fade Jim began to unwrap it gently and found, to his shock and surprise, that it was fully healed. Was he simply a fast healer? Was it due to Claire's attending to it? Or did those ladies do something that made it heal faster?
"So….what do you think, Claire?" Jim finally asked her, breaking the silence that had been thickening around them, "You think that we should trust them?"
"I don't know. It does sound rather too good to be true," Claire admitted, "But even if that stuff about you becoming human again proves to be a red herring the fact is that New York and New Jersey are only 13 hours away on foot, and about an hour drive. I think that once we get to New York we should be able to rent a couple of moving trucks to get them to Jersey quickly and safely, but even if we're not allowed or able the trolls should still be capable of hanging out under the bridge that separates them. Since it's your life we're talking about though, Jim, I think the decision should be yours."
"I-I see," Jim said, nodding his acknowledgement as he sat down, unsheathing his blade and looking at his reflection as he thought to himself. Could it be that Merlin was wrong, that it is possible for him to regain the life as a human he'd given up in order to save his family and friends? Or was the words those crones whispered in his ears false, just a cruel practical joke they were playing on him or, even worse, the bait to a trap set for him and/or his friends. As much as he wanted to just play it safe those women had picked the one temptation he might not be able to turn down. Which course was the right course for him to take?
